MWC 2015: HTC Grip is a fitness tracker for actual athletes

Fitness trackers are often used by couch potatoes looking to turn things around, but the HTC Grip should actually appeal to enthusiast runners.

Here’s the exciting bit: the HTC Grip has GPS, something missing from just about every other small-size fitness tracking gadget. This means you can accurately track your runs rather than just bodging the distance by working out your number of strides.

Given it packs in GPS, the HTC Grip is alarmingly slim. It really isn’t a chunky runner’s watch, but rather a fitness band just like the other trendy trackers.

At this point, we know the HTC Grip will last for around two days without using GPS, but you can expect that to drop down around five hours with active tracking of your runs or cycle rides using proper GPS.

The Grip hasn’t had to sacrifice the screen to pack GPS in either. There’s a 1.8-inch AMOLED display that curves around the band, fitting your wrist.

HTC has teamed-up with UA Record for the Grip’s tracking software, which should give it pretty good tracking chops, and it'll work with Android and iOS devices. While we don’t know how much the HTC Grip will cost, HTC says it’ll be available soon. We'll give you more details just as soon as we have them.